International Rebellion - Rebel For Life

Extinction Rebellion are blocking the streets of London over multiple days to demand that the government take necessary action on the climate and ecological crisis.

Saturday 13th & Sunday 14th April – Build Up Weekend – briefing, training, connecting and preparing with other Rebels in London, details here

Sunday 14th April – Earth March. Arrives at Hyde Park

Monday 15th April – International Rebellion Day One

11am Parliament Square6pm Marble Arch:our first night – rebellious performance and music begins

16th April – Day Two: If the Government has not responded, we will shut down the city across four sites.

17th April – Day Three: Open Rebellion For As Long As It Takes – If there is still no response, we will begin to block roads outwards from the sites and continue to stage and escalate our creative non-violent direct action.

https://rebellion.earth/get-active/international-rebellion-a-guide-for-participants/

The Socialist Party can sympathise with the sentiments of the participants in Extinction Rebellion's acts of civil disobedience, but we must also recognise the ultimate folly of confronting the power of State head-on to extract promises and pledges from the government. Extinction Rebellion are little different from previous protesters and are radical reformers making demands upon the government in the mistaken belief that a government can fulfil their aspirations. 

It is unfortunate that so many sincere and motivated people possess a lack of understanding of the workings of capitalism. If market forces essentially cause and create environmental damage by literally encouraging an irrational human impact on nature, how can you realistically expect those self-same forces to solve it?

Capitalism is not a rational system, as the capitalist class have their own agenda which is totally blind to the common interest. A fundamental contradiction of capitalism is that although the capitalist cooperate to keep the system going, by necessity they also have to compete with one another within the market. If they don't compete they go under or are at best taken over. This built-in business rivalry always results in casualties in some form or another and first and foremost is the price it has on the environment. The choice being presented by proposals being put forward are that the real external costs is to be shared out among the global capitalist class as a whole through a general environmental taxation. Or the costs are to be paid by the individual capitalists, managed by the respective national governments. So will capitalism step back from the brink? Will it be able to prevent itself from destroying the environment?

The capitalist system is dependent on economic growth and the accumulation of capital on a larger and larger global scale. And in order to achieve an accumulation of capital, market forces must create and produce commodities on a mass scale. When confronted by any barriers of environmental legislation which diminish the rate of expected profits and the accumulation of capital, the capitalists will do what they have always done for short-term profits: finding or creating loopholes. It is inevitable with regulatory reforms they must be by-passed in order to fit in with the needs of the system. 

Capitalism will enact reforms because the capitalists themselves realise that their investments are being damaged by the lack of environmental concern so in the months to come they will attempt a more self-regulating laws. Needless to say, these laws will be evaded by those powerful enough to do so. The capitalists are all agreed the planet belongs to them. If capitalists really wants something then the environment, will take second place. One thing is certain and that is human society is at present organised in the interests of a small minority and short of challenging with that basic condition any efforts, no matter how sincere or thoughtful, are futile. Anyone who has been frightened and concerned for what is happening to our environment can have no reason for standing aside from the case for the abolition of capitalism and its replacement by a social system where people and the planet are the priority, not the drive for profits and capital accumulation.

The Socialist Party is very aware of what Extinction Rebellion are up against and we have no intention of misleading them by suggesting that capitalism's dynamic can be controlled or that a string of legislative reforms will be of any lasting benefit. Eco-warriors' ideas of a world compatible with a market exchange economy are illusory. While the non-violent direct action policies of Extinction Rebellion and others such as the US-based Sunrise Movement and the Fridays for Future school-student strikers may achieve limited success changing government policies and lobbying for legislation, at the end of the day, they will never be able to combat the motive of profit which is the root cause of the problems they wish to ameliorate and are destined to struggle endlessly against the tide of capitalism. The Earth, and all its natural and industrial resources, must become the common heritage of all humanity and we can begin to organise our relationship with the rest of nature in a genuinely sustainable way.